Underdog Clinton Goes After Obama

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VIDEO: Post's Balz and Cillizza on Saturday's Debate

The Washington Post's Dan Balz and washingtonpost.com's Chris Cillizza talk about the Republican and Democratic debates.

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The look and feel of the Democratic debate was striking: Only one white male candidate, Edwards, was onstage. Nonetheless, apart from Clinton's gender comment, the conversation barely touched on identity politics, instead focusing on what it takes to bring about change in Washington. At one point, ABC moderator Charles Gibson said that in all his years of covering Washington he has seen many candidates promise change.

Still, as she spoke of change, Clinton also turned to her husband's track record in the 1990s as part of her own. Referring to him as "President Clinton," she said his ability to tackle the budget deficit when he took office showed that candidates who promise change sometimes deliver it.

Richardson added: "Whatever happened to experience? Is experience a leper? We want to change this country. But you have to have, you have to know how to do it. And there's nothing wrong with having experience. So, I love change. We all are for change. But the question is, examine the record of those that in the past produced change."

Before the debate, Clinton rolled out a new campaign approach, dramatically shortening her stump speech and taking dozens of questions from voters in an effort to appear more at ease. Her campaign officials said the emphasis on questions and answers was designed to draw a contrast with Obama. They hoped that the more Clinton showed her command of the issues, the more it would force voters to question whether Obama has the same mastery of the issues and, ultimately, the readiness to be president.

Clinton's shift came as a CNN-WMUR poll taken by the University of New Hampshire showed Obama and Clinton tied at 33 percent, with Edwards at 20 percent. A week ago, Clinton led Obama, 34 percent to 30 percent. In a striking demographic development for Obama, he now runs evenly with Clinton among women for the first time (Clinton 33 percent, Obama 32); a week ago Clinton had an 11-point edge among women.

Staff writers Shailagh Murray and Alec MacGillis contributed to this report.